6.19.2008

In a video message released this morning, Barack Obama announced he is opting out of public financing. This makes him the first candidate ever to rely on private donations to finance his general election campaign, and it will give him a giant advantage over John McCain. While the Republican will be limited to spending $85 million between the convention and Election Day, Obama will be able to spend as much money as he raises -- and some estimate that could be as high as $300 million.

The McCain campaign has long been pressuring Obama to respect what they call as his pledge to take public financing if McCain does. Obama had taken no such pledge but had said that he would "aggressively pursue an agreement". To justify his decision today, Obama argued that the RNC's fundraising advantage over the DNC coupled with the possibility that independent groups air attack ads in the next few months would have put him at a disadvantage had he accepted to limit his general election spending. Democrats also argue that the huge size of their small-donor list means that they have found an "alternative" public financing system.

(I for one find that this second point unconvincing because what is appealing about the campaign finance is that it maintains some equity between different candidates' spending and prevents the highest spender to simply buy his way into office. I agree that the sytem is so messed up that it makes little sense to blame Obama, that it makes no sense for the McCain campaign to say they "believe in public financing" when they did not take it for the primary, and that it would have been politically suiscidal for Obama to reject it. But in a hopefully not-too-distant future we can hope for a better European-style campaign finance system that also puts stringent limits on RNC/DNC/outside-group spending and in which candidates do opt in. TPM reports that some reform activists have a similar take on the "alternative system" argument. And Senator Russ Feingold also criticized Obama, saying that the general election system was not broken.)

The McCain campaign believes they have an opportunity to hurt Obama with this issue. They are now insisting that Obama broke his words and are blasting him as just another "typical politician who will do and say whatever is most expedient for Barack Obama." McCain insisted today that this is a "big, big deal." The goal is clear: Hurt Obama's posing as a "change" candidate and the reform image that the Democrat has tried to embody. The problem for McCain's campaign is that... this is a deeply hypocritical reaction. Given the financing problems the Republican candidate has himself, it's difficult for me to understand how he is hoping to claim the reform mantle on this one.

Not only did McCain reverse his position on whether to take public financing in the primary (the period that ends at the conventions at the end of the summer), but he opted out after using the promise of matching funds to secure loans in the fall of 2007. There is a possibility that doing so should have locked McCain in the public financing system and the head of the FEC said as much a few months ago. (more background on this controversy here). Taking advantage of the FEC's lacking a quorum to take action against him and rule on whether he was forced to respect the limits that come with public financing, McCain broke those spending limits. The DNC has filed lawsuits against this but they have little chance of getting anywhere until the Senate resolves its stalemate over FEC nominees. Given this reversal whose very legality is under question, does McCain have any legitimacy to accuse Obama of breaking his word and abandoning the reform mantle?

Even if McCain was clean on the issue and could unproblematically present himself as the reform candidate here, another problem remains: such issues very rarely have any resonance with the electorate, and while the GOP might try to put this in relation with whatever other talking points it has to demonstrate that Obama is just a "typical politician," it's unlikely to do much for them. After all, none of the Clinton campaign's accusations of Obama engaging in negative attacks despite preaching "new politics" hurt the Illinois Senator -- and campaign finance is not something that arouses voter passion.

Ultimately, Obama's prodigious fundraising ability terrifies Republicans, who are worried about being swamped under the Senator's machine. Opting out of public finance allows Obama to outspend McCain in key swing states, but it is in more marginally competitive races that the difference could be the most significant. Indeed, both campaigns need to spend a large portion of their resources in states like Florida, Ohio and Wisconsin. Once all of that is accounted for, how much more of his $84 million will McCain retain to invest in New Jersey, Connecticut and California and to defend states like Alaska and Georgia? Obama, on the other hand, will have millions to run ads and send staffers to states that are not high-priority. That will allow him to develop an alternative electoral map in states like Nevada, Colorado and Virginia while also contesting Ohio and Florida and testing GOP vulnerabilities in third-tier statses.

14 Comments:

A not unexpected decision that I think will have a small short-term down side but be forgotten in a week or two. McCain surragates will whine and complain but few people outside the true beleivers really care. The interesting part of this release was that; instead of the usual late Friday evening press release; Obama put out a video explaining his thinking in some detail. I feel this is a smart move in that shows he wants to focus on the election funding system and takes away one of the Republican talking points (that he was trying to hide this change in policy) that they will use in trying to push this as an important issue.

I definitely agree with you Fritz. This decision, while expected, will have a short term downside because McCain and his people will say that Obama is breaking his promise and I'm sure that Fox News personalalties like Hannity will say that if Obama breaks his promise to stay within the public system, will he not break his promises on the polices that he expresses to believe in? However the fact that most of his contributions come from small doners only giving $20-$50 dollars gives him great cover from being labled a interest group minion.

The long term benefits of this is undeniable. Obama is one of the most unknown Democratic nominees ever and he needs as much money as he can get to define himself before McCain does it for him. This is epecially because his bounce after getting the nomination is so small. If he was restricted by public financing then it is possible that GOP led 527s (like he said in his video) could try to swift boat him with questions of patrotism or Wright and he would be unable to respond. In addition, if Obama wants to maximize his chances in this election, and with his own weaknesses, he needs to spread McCain's resources as much as he can. It seems that Michigan will be the most contested state in this election as McCain knows that if he wins that state and Obama doesn't win Ohio then he has a good chance at an electoral college win. Obama can use his superior funding to contest not just Michigan and other toss up states like Missori and Virgina but also go into favored McCain states like Alaska and South Dakota. Putting money into a single state does have dimishinig returns, so being able to spread it around maximizes Obama's chances at this election.

"A not unexpected decision that I think will have a small short-term down side but be forgotten in a week or two. McCain surragates will whine and complain but few people outside the true beleivers really care."

Obama will be able to say, "You broke the public financing rules already. Why should I believe you won't do it again?" Then he could switch the topic to McCain flip-flopping on finance reform.

Then there's McCain's apparent commitment to the bank that gave him the bridge loan that he would stay in the race even if he bombed in NH so that he could continue to collect public and private money to pay off the debt. Not to mention his incestuous relationship with lobbyists.

John better tread carefully. As Barack said (to the consternation of a lot of the lip-pursers) "they bring knives, we bring guns".

Obama already lied when he said he would serve out his first Senate term in full, so why start being truthfull now? As long as he can provide lenghty excuses he should continue to break promises if it benefits him politically. It's the Chicago way!

Anon ok vote for McCain, is either Barrack with all its faults or another 4 years of an extreme right winger. the old mac is dead, he totally transformed himself to win over the Right in his party, I assume you are a Hillary supporter so you stand for reproductive rights, you know Mccain has an awful record on womens rights and If you hope that a dem congress can help neuter those hopes you are delusional, because many Democrats support the measures McCain would takeso the decision its pretty clear to me vote Mccain and betray all that Hillary stood for ,or vote Obama witch policly wise is the same as Hillary

carlos, ignore the idiot trolls. They're either GOP operatives or Clinton jihadists (I sue that term to distinguish them from the mass of rational Clinton supporters) who would rather torch the party and punish the rest of us than settle for a close second best. They're here to provoke, not to engage in rational discussion.

(Not the other anonymous)I dont agree that no one will notice. I think most of his grass roots supporters have gotten involved with his campaign because of his talk of campaign finance reform. He might be gambling more than he realizes.

Personally, I think the grass roots supporters who've gotten involved with the Obama campaign are just fine with a Presidential campaign run entirely off their small donations. I haven't seen anything anywhere to show differently.

Honestly, do you really think that people are going to say, "I'm really upset that Obama isn't using my taxes to run for President"? I'm going to say no.

Obama has so much cover on this issue it would have only been notable if he had capitulated and taken the public financing. And trust me, that would have been the only thing that would have upset his supporters that truly want an Obama Presidency in November.

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